Risa and Otani are best friends, but they argue all the time. They argue so much that their fights look like a comedy routine, in fact the school has dubbed them the All Hanshin Kyo. (A comedy team from Kansai where a short guy and tall guy fight to everyone's enjoyment). They even answer questions at exactly the same time and adore a pop singer named Umibozou. The thing is, Risa is a 172cm tall girl and Otani is a 156cm tall boy. This does strain things at times since neither can find a love partner because of their height. Finally they make a bet, first one to get a partner will get a free present from the other half (Risa will get video games, and Otani will get new basketball shoes).

Based on a shoujo manga by Nakahara Aya, serialised in Margaret.

Aired 4/7/07
Animation by Toei Animation & Shueisha.
24 TV Episodes.

There is also a Japanese live-action TV-drama series which is viewable (subtitled/streaming) at Mysoju.
1:38min Anime Excerpt - YouTube Video

3.958375

6

Risa and Otani are best friends, but they argue all the time. They argue so much that their fights look like a comedy routine, in fact the school has dubbed them the All Hanshin Kyo. (A comedy team from Kansai where a short guy and tall guy fight to everyone's enjoyment). They even answer questions at exactly the same time and adore a pop singer named Umibozou. The thing is, Risa is a 172cm tall girl and Otani is a 156cm tall boy. This does strain things at times since neither can find a love partner because of their height. Finally they make a bet, first one to get a partner will get a free present from the other half (Risa will get video games, and Otani will get new basketball shoes).

Based on a shoujo manga by Nakahara Aya, serialised in Margaret.

Aired 4/7/07
Animation by Toei Animation & Shueisha.
24 TV Episodes.

There is also a Japanese live-action TV-drama series which is viewable (subtitled/streaming) at Mysoju.
1:38min Anime Excerpt - YouTube Video

Lovely Complex
For the most part, Lovely Complex offers up a typical shoujo rom-com with the "will they or won't they" story played up in the developing relationship between Risa and Otani. Potential rivals, fangirls ogling for an attractive teacher, obliviousness to love, a model being one of said rivals, misunderstandings testing the bond of our main pairing. It's nothing bad per say, but I've seen it done enough in the past decade I've watched anime. On the plus side, Risa and Otani's chemistry is unique enough in their interactions where their squabbles with one another are usually humorous and they don't get in the heavy loads of melodrama that shoujo romance titles like to milk with their couplings. Beyond that, I'm mostly indifferent to this series since I've seen similar titles like it with what it mostly delivers. If you're new to shoujo anime, this may catch your interest. But otherwise, I'd say your mileage will vary with this one.

Last updated Wednesday, February 05 2014. Created Sunday, January 09 2011.

Lovely Complex
This anime is officially one of my favourite anime of all time!

My friend was watching it and i thought i'd give it a try and boy was i hooked! It was so funny my jaw ached from laughing so much.

I thought it had a decent different storyline (seriously, how many animes out there about a girl liking a shorter guy?), the relationship between koizumi and otani was very cute. Characters were chucked in here and there and i think, they could of expanded on them a little bit more (but i guess those characters were just the catalyst in koizumi and otani's relationship). the third and second last episodes could of been better, it seemed abit rushed to me.

But overall it was a good anime, very enjoyable to watch, i think i'll be watching it again some day. LOL.

Ps. MAITY SENSEI! MAITY SENSEI! MAITY SENSEI!

Last updated Monday, November 12 2007. Created Monday, November 12 2007.

Lovely Complex
I've gotta mark this as buy. I enjoyed it too much to simply rent. At first I hadn't a clue what I would be expecting.... until I started seeing the outrageous SD, the silly expressions Otani & Risa would make, I was cracking up and getting side aches.

The whole story was very well done... abit the final 2 (minus the end) episodes i thought they could have done better. Some characters were introduced here and there that I wished had more time to develop... such as the cutie neighbor of Otani's.

Overall, a great series and if they were to come out with another season, i'd be sure to watch.

Last updated Thursday, November 08 2007. Created Thursday, November 08 2007.

Ok this was a pretty good series. But to put it in mathematical terms here's how I enjoyed the series Enjoyment=(ABS(Eps#-12) * 100). Which means I enjoyed the beginning and ending ALOT but didn't really care for the middle. Up to Lisa's confession and after Otani FINALLY kisses her were good. But the whole Otani didn't care Arc was pretty stupid and painful to watch. The OP also changed after 12 and I hated it. I liked Otani's singing in the beginning.

You know I wonder if this is the first Anime spoken exclusively in Kansai dialect?

Seiko was my most favorite character but it only got about 3 true episodes.

Anyone catch the name of their hero Umibozou? His name is from City Hunter!

Lovely Complex
I am just enjoying this series too much to not share my opinion. If you can enjoy a very light hearted and silly high school romance story – with lots of yelling and SD (super-deformed) animation, then this is a pretty good bet.

No magic, mystery or monsters in this series, but a lot of goofy humor, slapstick comedy and laughs.

It's official: Lovely Complex is my number one favorite series of the Spring 2007 season. I went into episode one knowing nothing about it but presuming it to be a romantic comedy, and that turned out to be correct. I'm a hard person to disappoint when it comes to shows of this sort, but I still had my fingers crossed in hopes that the writers would have a truly good sense of humor. The OP sequence, with it's distinctive character designs, slapstick humor, SD humor, and general wackiness was encouraging. The characters and story reminded me a little of Peach Girl and Bokura Ga Ita (it looks like this show will be significantly less serious and more goofy than those). I sort of identified with unusually tall girl Koizumi, since that's how I got my own nickname (the animation in the ED sequence of her lanky way of walking is really neat). Anyway, halfway through I was confident that this show wouldn't be a disaster but uncertain whether it would be truly good; and then it started cracking me up. At one point I nearly had tears in my eyes from laughing so hard. In fact, the thought occured to me that this just might be the most outright funny show of the season. I can't help feeling that otherwise there haven't been any truly standout comedies this season--a number of good ones, but no really great ones--so this dark horse is especially welcome. Lovely Complex is a riot; the SD faces are truly weird and truly funny (see episode 2 for examples). Seriously, this show represents the most skillful use of SD artwork I've ever seen. There's a countless variety of charicaturized facial expressions for every possible emotion--it's brilliant. As for dialogue, some shows simply have no memorable lines, but that clearly will not be a problem here. The plot looks good, too--I'm glad they didn't rush ahead and make Koizumi and Otani already a couple before the very first episode ended.

It's official: Lovely Complex slipped somewhat in my rankings during the Summer 2007 season. Whereas it was running neck-and-neck with Lucky Star during the spring and edged it out, now Lucky Star is ahead by a wide margin. And whereas Lucky Star started out in an uncertain manner but then got better, Lovely Complex seems to have been at it's best early on and went slowly downhill since then. Koizumi just seemed to be banging her head against a brick wall as she tried to get Otani to like her. I couldn't help wondering why a number of characters were introduced, but then played only a brief part in the series. I certainly continued watching, but only at the rate of one episode of this show after I'd watched one episode each of twenty or so other series which I was trying to keep up with. Make no mistake, Lovely Complex remained fun to the end, and I'm a little sorry to see it go. The final episode was well done, and will no doubt leave me with pleasant memories of this show.

My favorite line: "And here I thought you were someone who bore a grudge against giraffes in his past life" --Koizumi